C.A. Shoultz

WHILE our main focus for the first half of 2019 will be discussing how to remake the short story, we’ll continue to present, on occasion, significant new poetry.

Our mission at New Pop Litis to find the best, develop the best, present the best in the best possible light and promote that presentation.

Toward that end we bring back poet C. A. Shoultz with“The Valley”— a foray into nature, into a forest devastated, devoured by civilization, but maybe not all the way. We trust you’ll enjoy the images, the cadences– and the punchline.

Without the roots of trees, the ground had run,And had become a mass of bare brown mud.I saw a twist of roots that had been pulled,Now lying like some tangled corpses’ limbs.

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(WE’LL be presenting much more poetry this month: from southern poet James D. CaseyIV; from new talent Kai Warmoth; and last-but-not-least from iconic Philadelphia wordmaster Frank D. Walsh, who has every tool in the poet’s toolbox at his disposal. Will Frank’s work live up to his rep? We’ll find out.)

LABOR DAY in the United States is upon us! Traditionally, marking the end of summer. Of lazy days and magical nights during which anything can happen. To celebrate the soon-to-vanish season, we present “On Midsummer’s Night” by C.A. Shoultz— containing wisps of ghosts of night which themselves may disappear before we’ve fully experienced their call, their magic.

And then a child appeared to me–Or not a child, for so he seemedMuch older than he looked to be.He handed me a crimson mask.“For life and love,” he said, so free–I shrugged, and put the red mask on,And through the woods was further drawn.

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ALSO– Labor Day means the return of classes and students to colleges across the land. Will the reintroduction of one of America’s most renowned writers, Junot Diaz, to the public world as a professor at MIT go smoothly? We’ve covered the controversy all summer at our NPL News site. Here’s background on the issue.

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FINALLY, we introduce our Complaint Department. Have a problem with ourselves, our site, or our ideas? Let us know about it! Thanks.

***(Main painting by Ferdinand du Puigaudeau; second painting by John Simmons.)